Macklin passed other tents, cardboard box shelters and cars that housed whole families. The smell of the salt lake stung his nostrils, promised a pain and a cleansing beyond anything Macklin had ever experienced. The land began to slope slightly downward toward the water’s edge, and lying on the ground around him were blood-caked clothes, rags, crutches and bandages torn off and discarded by other supplicants before him.
He remembered the screams he’d heard in the night, and his nerve faltered. He stopped less than twenty feet from where the lake rippled up over the rocky shore. His phantom hand was itching, and the stump throbbed painfully with his heartbeat. I can’t take it, he thought. Oh, dear God, I can’t!
“Discipline and control, mister,” a voice said, off to his right. The Shadow Soldier was standing there, white, bony hands on hips, the moonlike face streaked with commando greasepaint under the helmet’s rim. “You lose those, and what have you got?”
Macklin didn’t answer. The lapping of the water on the shore was both seductive and terrifying.
“Your nerve going bye-bye, Jimmy boy?” the Shadow Soldier asked, and Macklin thought that the voice was similar to his father’s. It carried the same note of taunting disgust. “Well, I’m not surprised,” the Shadow Soldier continued. “You sure pulled a royal fuckup at Earth House, didn’t you? Oh, you really did a fine job!”
“No!” Macklin shook his head. “It wasn’t my fault!” The Shadow Soldier laughed quietly. “You knew, Jimmy boy. You knew something was wrong in Earth House, and you kept packing the suckers in because you smelled the green of the Ausley cash, didn’t you? Man, you killed all those poor chumps! You buried ’em under a few hundred tons of rock and saved your own ass, didn’t you?”
Now Macklin thought it really was his father’s voice, and he thought that the Shadow Soldier’s face was beginning to resemble the fleshy, hawk-nosed face of his long-dead father as well. “I had to save myself,” Macklin replied, his voice weak. “What was I supposed to do, lie down and die?”
“Shit, that kid’s got more sense and guts than you do, Jimmy boy! He’s the one who got you out! He kept you moving, and he found food to keep your ass alive! If it wasn’t for that kid, you wouldn’t be standing here right now shaking in your shoes because you’re afraid of a little pain! That kid knows the meaning of discipline and control, Jimmy boy! You’re just a tired old cripple who ought to go out in that lake, duck your head under and take a quick snort like they did.” The Shadow Soldier nodded toward the lake, where the bloated bodies of suicides floated in the brine. “You used to think being head honcho at Earth House was the bottom of the barrel. But this is the bottom, Jimmy boy. Right here. You’re not worth a shit, and you’ve lost your nerve.”
“No I haven’t!” Macklin said. “I… haven’t.”
A hand gestured toward the Great Salt Lake. “Prove it.”
Roland sensed someone outside the tent. He sat up, clicking the safety off the automatic. Sometimes the men came around at night, sniffing for Sheila, and they had to be scared off.
A flashlight shone in his face, and he aimed the pistol at the figure who held it.
“Hold it,” the man said. “I don’t want any trouble.”
Sheila cried out and sat bolt upright, her eyes wild. She drew herself away from the man with the light. She’d been having that nightmare again, of Rudy shambling to the tent, his face bleached of blood and the wound at his throat gaping like a hideous mouth, and from between his purple lips came a rattling voice that asked, “Killed any babies lately, Sheila darlin’?”
“You’ll get trouble if you don’t back off.” Roland’s eyes were fierce behind the goggles. He held the pistol steady, his finger poised on the trigger.
“It’s me. Judd Lawry.” He shone the flashlight on his own face. “See?”
“What do you want?”
Lawry pointed the light at Macklin’s empty sleeping bag. “Where’d the Colonel go?”
“Out. What do you want?”
“Mr. Kempka wants to talk to you.”
“What about? I delivered the ration last night.”
“He wants to talk,” Lawry said. “He says he’s got a deal for you.”
“A deal? What kind of deal?”
“A business proposal. I don’t know the details. You’ll have to see him.”
“I don’t have to do anything,” Roland told him. “And whatever it is can wait until daylight.”
“Mr. Kempka,” Lawry said firmly, “wants to do business right now. It’s not important that Macklin be there. Mr. Kempka wants to deal with you. He thinks you’ve got a good head on your shoulders. So are you coming or not?”
“Not.”
Lawry shrugged. “Okay, then, I guess I’ll tell him you’re not interested.” He started to back out of the tent, then stopped. “Oh, yeah: He wanted me to give you this.” And he dropped a boxful of Hershey bars on the ground in front of Roland. “He’s got plenty of stuff like that over in the trailer.”
“Jesus!” Sheila’s hand darted into the box and plucked out some of the chocolate bars. “Man, it’s been a long time since I’ve had one of these!”
“I’ll tell him what you said,” Lawry told Roland, and again he started to leave the tent.
“Wait a minute!” Roland blurted out. “What kind of deal does he want to talk about?” “Like I say, you’ll have to see him to find out.” Roland hesitated, but he figured whatever it was couldn’t hurt. “I don’t go anywhere without the gun,” he said. “Sure, why not?”
Roland got out of his sleeping bag and stood up. Sheila, already finishing one of the chocolate bars, said, “Hey, hold on! What about me?” “Mr. Kempka just wants the boy.” “Kiss my ass! I’m not staying out here alone!” Lawry shrugged the strap of his shotgun off his shoulder and handed it to her. “Here. And don’t blow your head off by accident.”
She took it, realizing too late that it was the same weapon he’d used to kill the infant. Still, she wouldn’t dare be left out there alone without a gun. Then she turned her attention to the box of Hershey bars, and Roland followed Judd Lawry to the Airstream trailer, where yellow lantern light crept through the slats of the drawn window blinds.
On the edge of the lake, Macklin took off his black overcoat and the filthy, bloodstained T-shirt he wore. Then he began to unwrap the bandages from the stump of his wrist as the Shadow Soldier watched in silence. When he was done, he let the bandages fall. The wound was not pretty to look at, and the Shadow Soldier whistled at the sight.
“Discipline and control, mister,” the Shadow Soldier said. “That’s what makes a man.”
Those were the exact words of Macklin’s father. He had grown up bearing them pounded into his head, had fashioned them into a motto to live by. Now, though, to make himself walk into that salty water and do what had to be done was going to take every ounce of discipline and control he could summon.
The shadow Soldier said in a singsong voice, “Hup two three four, hup two three four! Get it in gear, mister!”
Oh, Jesus, Macklin breathed. He stood with his eyes tightly shut for a few seconds. His entire body shook with the cold wind and his own dread. Then he took the knife from his waistband and walked down toward the chuckling water.
“Sit down, Roland,” the Fat Man said as Lawry escorted Roland into the trailer. A chair had been pulled up in front of the table that Kempka sat behind. “Shut the door.”
Lawry obeyed him, and Roland sat down. He kept his hand on the pistol, and the pistol in his lap.
Kempka’s face folded into a smile. “Would you like something to drink? Pepsi? Coke? Seven-Up? How about something stronger?” He laughed in his high, shrill voice, and his many chins wobbled. “You are of legal age, aren’t you?”
“I’ll take a Pepsi.”
“Ah. Good. Judd, would you get us two Pepsis, please?”
Lawry got up and went to another room, which Roland figured must be a kitchen.
“What’d you want to see me about?�
�� Roland asked.
“A business deal. A proposition.” Kempka leaned back, and his chair popped and creaked like fireworks going off. He wore an open-collared sport shirt that showed wiry brown hair on his flabby chest, and his belly flopped over the belt line of his lime-green polyester trousers. Kempka’s hair had been freshly pomaded and combed, and the interior of the trailer smelled like cheap, sweet cologne. “You strike me as a very intelligent young boy, Roland. Young man, I should say.” He grinned. “I could tell right off that you had intelligence. And fire, too. Oh, yes! I like young men with fire.” He glanced at the pistol Roland held. “You can put that aside, you know. I want to be your friend.”
“That’s nice.” Roland kept the pistol aimed in Freddie Kempka’s direction. On the wall behind the Fat Man, the many rifles and handguns on their hooks caught the baleful yellow lamplight.
“Well,” Kempka shrugged, “we can talk anyway. Tell me about yourself. Where are you from? What happened to your parents?”
My parents, Roland thought. What had happened to them? He remembered them all going into Earth House together, remembered the earthquake in the cafeteria, but everything else was still crazy and disjointed. He couldn’t even recall exactly what his mother and father had looked like. They had died in the cafeteria, he thought. Yes. Both of them had been buried under rock. He was a King’s Knight now, and there was no turning back. “That’s not important,” he decided to say. “Is that what you wanted to talk about?”
“No, it’s not. I wanted to—ah, here are our refreshments!”
Lawry came in with Pepsis in two plastic glasses; he set one glass in front of Kempka and handed Roland the other. Lawry started to walk behind Roland, but the boy said sharply, “Stay in front of me while I’m in here,” and Lawry stopped. The man smiled, lifted his hands in a gesture of peace and sat on a pile of boxes against the wall.
“As I say, I like young men with fire.” Kempka sipped at his drink. It had been a long time since Roland had tasted a soft drink, and he chugged almost half the glassful down without stopping. The drink had lost most of its fizz, but it was still about the best stuff he’d ever tasted.
“So what is it?” Roland asked. “Something about the drugs?”
“No, nothing about that.” He smiled again, a fleeting smile, “I want to know about Colonel Macklin.” He leaned forward, and the chair squalled; he rested his forearms on the table and laced his thick fingers together. “I want to know… what Macklin offers you that I can’t.”
“What?”
“Look around,” Kempka said. “Look what I’ve got here: food, drink, candy, guns, bullets—and power, Roland. What does Macklin have? A wretched little tent. And do you know what? That’s all he’ll ever have. I run this community, Roland. I guess you could say I’m the law, the mayor, the judge and the jury all rolled up into one! Right?” He glanced quickly at Lawry, and the other man said, “Right,” with the conviction of a ventriloquist’s dummy.
“So what does Macklin do for you, Roland?” Kempka lifted his eyebrows. “Or should I ask what you do for him?”
Roland almost told the Fat Man that Macklin was the King—shorn of his crown and kingdom now, but destined to return to power someday—and that he had pledged himself as a King’s Knight, but he figured Kempka was about as smart as a bug and wouldn’t understand the grand purpose of the game. So Roland said, “We travel together.”
“And where are you going? To the same garbage dump Macklin is headed toward? No, I think you’re smarter than that.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean… that I have a large and comfortable trailer, Roland. I have a real bed.” He nodded toward a closed door. “It’s right through there. Would you like to see it?”
It suddenly dawned on Roland what Freddie Kempka had been getting at. “No,” he said, his gut tightening. “I wouldn’t.”
“Your friend can’t offer you what I can, Roland,” Kempka said in a silken voice. “He has no power. I have it all. Do you think I let you in here just because of the drugs? No. I want you, Roland. I want you here, with me.”
Roland shook his head. Dark motes seemed to spin before his eyes, and his head felt heavy, as if he couldn’t balance it any longer on his neck.
“You’re going to find that power rules this world.” Kempka’s voice sounded to Roland like a record played too fast. “It’s the only thing that’s worth a damn anymore. Not beauty, not love—nothing but power. And the man who has it can take anything he wants.”
“Not me,” Roland said. The words felt like marbles rolling off his tongue. He thought he was about to puke, and there was a needles-and-pins sensation in his legs. The lamplight was hurting his eyes, and when he blinked it took an effort to lift his lids again. He looked down into the plastic glass he held, and he could see grainy things floating at the bottom. He tried to stand up, but his legs gave way and he fell to his knees on the floor. Someone was bending over him, and he felt the .45 being taken from his nerveless fingers. Too late, he tried to grasp it back, but Lawry was grinning and stepping out of reach.
“I found a use for some of those drugs you brought me.” Now Kempka’s voice was slow and murky, an underwater slur. “I mashed up a few of those pills and made a nice little mixture. I hope you enjoy your trip.” And the Fat Man began to rise ponderously from his chair and stalk across the room toward Roland Croninger while Lawry went outside to smoke a cigarette.
Roland shivered, though sweat was bursting out on his face, and scurried away from the man on his hands and knees. His brain was doing flip-flops, everything was lurching, speeding up and then slowing to a crawl. The whole trailer wobbled as Kempka went to the door and threw the latches. Roland squeezed himself into a corner like a trapped animal, and when he tried to shout for the King to help him his voice almost blew his eardrums out.
“Now,” Kempka said, “we’ll get to know each other better, won’t we?”
Macklin stood in cold water up to the middle of his thighs, the wind whipping into his face and wailing off beyond the encampment. His groin crawled, and his hand gripped the knife so hard his knuckles had gone bone-white. He looked at the infected wound, saw the dark swelling that he needed to probe with the knife’s gleaming tip. Oh, God, he thought; dear God, help me…
“Discipline and control.” The Shadow Soldier was standing behind him. “That’s what makes a man, Jimmy boy.”
My father’s voice, Macklin thought. God bless dear old Dad, and I hope the worms have riddled his bones.
“Do it!” the Shadow Soldier commanded.
Macklin lifted the knife, took aim, drew in a breath of frigid air and brought the point of the blade down, down, down into the festered swelling.
The pain was so fierce, so white-hot, so all-consuming that it was almost pleasure.
Macklin threw back his head and screamed, and as he screamed he dug the blade deeper into the infection, deeper still, and the tears were running down his face and he was on fire between pain and pleasure. He felt his right arm becoming lighter as the infection drained out of it. And as his scream went up into the night where the other screams had gone before his, Macklin threw himself forward into the salt water and immersed the wound.
“Ah!” The Fat Man stopped a few feet from Roland and cocked his head toward the door. Kempka’s face was flushed, his eyes shining. The scream was just drifting away. “Listen to that music!” he said. That’s the sound of somebody being reborn.” He began to unbuckle his belt and draw it through the many loops of his huge waistband.
The images tumbling through Roland’s brain were a mixture of funhouse and haunted house. In his mind he was hacking at the wrist of the King’s right arm, and as the blade severed the hand a spray of blood-red flowers shot from the wound; a chorus line of mangled corpses in top hats and tuxedos kicked their way down the wrecked corridor of Earth House; he and the King were walking on a superhighway under a sullen scarlet sky, and the trees were made of bones and the lakes were steam
ing blood, and half-rotted remnants of human beings sped past in battered cars and tractor-trailer trucks; he was standing on a mountaintop as the gray clouds boiled above him. Below, armies fought with knives, rocks and broken bottles. A cold hand touched his shoulder and a voice whispered, “It can all be yours, Sir Roland.”
He was afraid to turn his head and look at the thing that stood behind him, but he knew he must. The power of hideous hallucination forced his head around, and he stared into a pair of eyes that wore Army surplus goggles. The flesh of that face was mottled with brown, leprous growths, the lips all but eaten away to reveal misshapen, fanged teeth. The nose was flat, the nostrils wide and ravaged. The face was his own, but distorted, ugly, reeking evil and bloodlust. And from that face his own voice whispered, “It can all be yours, Sir Roland—and mine, too.”
Towering over the boy, Freddie Kempka tossed his belt to the floor and began to shimmy out of his polyester trousers. His breathing sounded like the rumbling of a furnace.
Roland blinked, squinted up at the Fat Man. The hallucinatory visions were tumbling madly away, but he could still hear the thing’s whisper. He was shaking, couldn’t stop. Another vision whirled up from his mind, and he was on the ground, trembling as Mike Armbruster towered over him, about to beat him to a bloody pulp as the other high school kids and football jocks shouted and jeered. He saw Mike Armbruster’s crooked grin, and Roland felt a surge of maniacal hatred more powerful than anything he’d ever known. Mike Armbruster had already beaten him once, had already kicked him and spat on him as he was sobbing in the dust—and now he wanted to do it all over again.
But Roland knew he was far different—far stronger, far more cunning—than the little pansy-assed wimp who’d let himself be beaten until he’d peed in his pants. He was a King’s Knight now, and he’d seen the underside of Hell. He was about to show Mike Armbruster how a King’s Knight gets even.
1987 - Swan Song v4 Page 40
